Mathieu van der Poel: "I'm going to compete in the Mountain Bike World Championships without training"

As was announced a few days ago, Mathieu van der Poel will combine both the World Championship road race and the Mountain Bike World Championships. Now though the Dutchman has elaborated further, explaining how he will not have trained off-road prior to the event.

"I'm going to compete in the Mountain Bike World Championships without training. I'll be there anyway, so I'll try without pressure," the Alpecin-Deceuninck star explains in quotes collected by brujulabike.com. Whether or not van der Poel will be able to successfully transfer straight from road to mountain bike remains to be seen but the possibility of a famous double is intriguing.

The last time van der Poel competed on the Mountain Bike was at the Tokyo Olympics. On that fateful day, the Dutchman suffered a fall that gave him a back injury he still suffers with today. "I have to keep working on it," he says in reference to the injury. "Now I'm in the gym two days a week and that helps control the problem. I'm happy with how things are going now."

The ultimate goal for van der Poel is to return to the Olympic Games in 2024 where he hopes to put right what happened in Tokyo by claiming gold in Paris.